A Study on The Birefringence Measurement in Precision Optical Product

정밀 광학 부품의 복굴절 측정 방법에 관한 연구

Recently, injection molding process became more popular than ever to produce large quantities of high precision products. Extensive studies have been conducted for reducing the residual stresses and birefringence in injection-molded optical products. Flow-induced and thermally-induced stresses and birefringence have been found as two main sources during injection molding process. Generally, quantitative value of birefringence can be measured with polarizing microscope using the compensator. However, it is difficult to measure low order retardation with microscope, so developing a measurement system for low order optical path difference is in need. In the present paper, a system using Photo Elastic Modulator (PEM) is demonstrated to measure low phase retardation in injection-molded products.